The successful entrepreneur's playbook

Book review of How I Built This: The Unexpected Paths to Success from the World's Most Inspiring Entrepreneurs

In 2008, Jenn Hyman, a double Harvard graduate (undergraduate and business school), co-founded an online designer dress rental business called Rent the Runway, where women could rent expensive couture for a slice of the cost. Despite her pedigree, when she initially went around fundraising, her pitch was largely dismissed by venture capitalists who just didn’t “get” the business model. But Ms Hyman persevered because she strongly believed in what the start-up was trying to achieve — it wanted to boost the self-confidence and empower women by offering them the opportunity to wear designer clothes that otherwise would have been out